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Nick Riley's working holiday as a 27-year-old British backpacker in Australia in 2001 would have gone unnoticed except for one thing - he was Joanne Lees's secret lover.

This photograph was taken inside Kelly's Hotel, an Irish pub in the heart of Newtown, in late June 2001, a few days before Riley left Sydney on his way to the US to complete the last leg of a round-the-world trip.

It is not known if Lees was in the bar on this night, but the Herald can reveal that her relationship with the man she called "Steph" on a secret email account was as intense as it was brief.

Every Thursday night for a month between May and June, Lees would tell her longtime boyfriend, Peter Falconio, that she was going out for the night to stay with a girlfriend.

Instead, she headed to a large house in Brown Street, Newtown, to see a young man she met through another British backpacker named Tim Ford, who worked with her at Dymocks bookstore in George Street.

Ford and Riley, who worked at a nearby city office as an IT specialist, were drinking mates.

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To the small group of backpackers who met each week at another Newtown pub, the Coopers Arms, Joanne Lees and Nick Riley were just another couple, comfortably slotting into the easy lifestyle of young Brits on their first overseas jaunt.

The weekly get-togethers were just that: a meeting place to have a few beers, a game of pool and perhaps a meal in the cheap restaurants that line King Street.

To those who knew her during the weekly rendezvous, Joanne Lees was just another good looking and engaging young backpacker among the hundreds who flock to Australia each year.

It is a time of life when adventure and experimentation is high on the list of priorities, including the testing of relationships.

The fact that she was cheating on Falconio (soon to be murdered in the outback) did not raise a eyebrow.

"Joanne would turn up on a Thursday night," one friend of Riley's told the Herald yesterday. "I remember it clearly because that was our weekly night at the pub.

"She was bright and friendly, happy to talk to people without being overly loud. She didn't seem to be a big party girl, but then she was with a crowd who didn't know her very well.

"It was a small group of friends, probably not more than eight people. Most of us knew that Joanne had a longtime boyfriend but you never ask about these things and you don't cast judgements. Obviously, none of us knew Peter [Falconio].

"Joanne certainly seemed to like Nick. I wouldn't say they were all over each other but they certainly seemed comfortable in each other's company, and she always stayed the night in an upstairs bedroom at the front of the house. There were probably four people staying there at any time, so no one really noticed."

Riley was a different matter. The university graduate from Reading, west of London, had been in Sydney for eight or nine months, and had established a reputation as a young man who liked a beer, pretty women and a good time. "He was a smart guy, but probably partied a bit much; he wanted to be known as a lad," another friend said.

"He worked a few different jobs, in finance and IT as I remember. The only thing I noticed was that he seemed to try and cover his obvious public school background. It was a bit grating at times because he would put on a cockney accent that didn't sound real, but he was a nice sort of guy."

Former housemates also remember Ford, who often dossed on a downstairs couch. Although Ford knew Lees was cheating on Falconio, he said in an interview after the murder that they were "the perfect couple".

"All the time I spent with Jo and all the time I spent with Pete I never saw anything amiss between them," he told London's Evening Standard newspaper. "They were just wonderful together. I know she was hoping Pete would propose to her in Hawaii, which was going to be their last stop before they flew home to England."

The affair ended in late June when both continued their journeys. Lees headed off with Falconio to Canberra, Melbourne, Adelaide and Alice Springs. Riley flew to the US to join a Contiki tour before returning to Reading. He has not been back.

Although the physical relationship had ended, the pair stayed in contact through a secret email account, according to evidence at the committal hearing of Falconio's alleged murderer, Bradley John Murdoch.

"I wouldn't class it as an affair or a relationship," Lees said when forced to reveal that she had sex with Riley. Perhaps it might have become one had they met in Berlin as she suggested to him in one email sent to "Steph" in the days after Falconio's murder on July 14.